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I didn’t turn back to fight Trisiagga because I still had a gigantified wolf to worry about. With an Orestanian army to protect and a titanic creature of utterly unknown capabilities, I couldn’t remove potentially the only thing keeping it in check.
Yes, I was well aware that paralyzing us like that might be the creature’s actual purpose. But the unreasonable levels of mana that I could see in that creature weren’t consistent with it being a mere decoy or bluff.
So, as the asura staggered from the blow I had landed, I departed. I hadn’t landed a lethal blow, but I had struck her hard enough that she needed time to recover. As she worked to get control of her flight, I used the rest of the [Purification] to snipe the last few remaining blood insects, then resumed my cloak, disappearing from her sight.
My mind was still in Tiana Full Battle Mode, still calculating tactics and situation, still evaluating my moves. The original Tiana had been a tactical genius. Fighting with practice swords, she could match the Royal Sword Master, and swordplay wasn’t her only strength. Tiana FBM was in her comfort zone right now, quickly settling on the best course and taking it.
I had left Trisiagga somewhere in empty territory near the Hamagaaran border in the far northern plains of Orestania. I was leaving it once again, nearing Cara Ita. Since I didn’t know how quickly Trisiagga could reform that demonic swarm, I needed to get Aenëe as quickly as possible to a place of safety and finish healing her. I needed it for myself, as well. I was continuing to push my pneuma beyond known territory. I needed to rest.
Not knowing what tricks Trisiagga might still have, I kept the vampire cloak. It was starting to bite severely into my stocks of Darkness mana in my blood core, and it continued to task my pneuma, but I had no choice.
I needed that place of safety for one other reason. It was something I wasn’t sure I could pull off, but I needed a solid and secure location before I tried it.
It would be a seriously bad decision to choose Prince Ged’s camp as that place of safety, though. Once Trisiagga recovered the ability to repeat the spell, she was sure to send those bugs forth again. The Tiana FBM analysis of that spell showed that the blood insects were effective, but she had to be within a fairly short range. She was sure to send them toward the camp, so that was the last place I should choose.
Instead I headed south, meaning not only south of Ged’s location, but south of the Hamagaaran Highlands in their entirety. The Highlands themselves were still human territory, but they were sparsely settled, rife with monsters and likely to be swarming with Trisiagga’s allies.
However, they were composed of the diminishing ends of the many parallel ridges forming the great mountainous back of the Baris Continent, the Dragonsbacks. In Hamagaar, even the northern end of the Great Wall falls in its final hundred miles to become merely the western extension of the Highlands.
Ahead of me rose the true Dragonsbacks. Borders in that territory lacked clear definition, mostly because the masters of that region don’t give a flying who-cares about humans and their need to draw borders. Humans only need to keep out. Keep out from where? Not our problem.
Naturally, the only mortal race I could possibly be talking about are the dwarves. By which I do not mean polite city dwellers like Firgolmir and Drusella, the father and daughter team who rebuilt my armor before I went to Cara Ita, and probably remade it to Mother’s specifications before she forwarded it to me in Tëan Tír. City dwellers distinguish themselves from the rest of their race specifically by how well they get along with humans. As for the rest of dwarvenkind… I think I’ve already defined the problem.
As I reached the territory I was seeking, I reluctantly extended myself even farther, spreading my [Blood Mist]. I hated doing this not only because of the extra pneuma drain but because it was also a drain on my Darkness mana supply. But it had to be done.
This time, I was looking for a place rather than a creature. I skimmed closer to the hills to aid my search.
I slowly combed a cross section of the surface three miles wide. I wasn’t trying to take in everything. The [Blood Mist] is somewhat autonomous. You send it out with a clear description of what you want it to be vigilant for. It might be creatures of a particular description, or movements of armed individuals or particular species. Or it might simply be a typical burrow of a particular mortal race.
It wouldn’t be easy. Dwarves don’t exactly hang signs advertising their locations. At least, not on the surface. Their mines are next to impossible for strangers to find. Fortunately, I wasn’t looking for one, but what I was looking for was only somewhat easier to locate.
Dwarves don’t live in a cute house in the woods, and they don’t sing on their way to the mine, either. But they also don’t live in the mine. I’ve mentioned this before, but mines are inherently unsafe places on Huade.
Instead, they create dwarven dwells, subterranean complexes that are neither underground cities nor open caverns like Ilim Below. They have magically protected ventilation to the surface, but they are never closer than a dozen paces to it.
They also have magically protected emergency exits ascending to the surface, but those are also closely guarded secrets, disguised with illusion magic that almost nobody but a fairy could see through. And while I might be more or less a fairy, the protections on them are a hassle to overcome. Instead, to access a dwarven dwell, one must take a dwarven highway.
Such highways lead from dwell to dwell, usually linking several dozen within the area of a small country. And being dwarven, they do so underground.
Although I had not come into this region before in modern times, I expected to find this highway entrance ramp because it had been marked on the map I copied when I came to Cara Ita. That map was long gone, or rather, filed away somewhere in Mother’s estate in Atius, but I remembered it quite well. And, in the area I expected, an entrance– I suppose it’s an ‘exit’ if I use the highway terminology Robert grew up with– showed up for me.
I pulled the mist in from all other directions as I turned toward it, and then scarfed it up from the path ahead of me like a pac-man munching dots as I followed it to my destination.
One last problem lay in my way, in the form of a simple Earth-element magic shield.
The correct way to deal with this shield is to use a pass that would disable the magic shield temporarily, provided you are in fact the person who belongs to that pass.
Naturally, I had no pass. So I drew Durandal, aiming him in my direction of flight while simultaneously dumping Wind mana out of my blood core.
Old Man, leave the Wind I am filling you with alone. I’ll be using it for a spell.
My attacks are more efficient than yours, Durandal noted as I poured the mana into him.
I admit that, I answered, but it needs to be a Wind attack, and [Holy Rend] strikes too wide for this target. Most of it would be wasted on the mountainside.
Less efficient or not, it had to fit into the hole ahead of me, which I could now see in my fairy sight, which was not fooled by the illusion spell cast upon it. I sucked in the last of the [Blood Mist] as I drew closer to the entrance, then silently chanted, [Wind Bullet]!
Previously, a machine gun effect had converted overcharged mana into a stream of bullets, because I was trying to push enough for twenty or thirty missiles into a single round. The amount of pneuma I was using to drive the spell limited the size of each missile, creating a series, instead. Now, with the addition of my spiritual vessel, I had a much greater pneuma volume, so the missiles could be much larger, similar to the huge fist of Earth that Durandal could deliver. Well, sort of similar.
It was still true that Durandal could deliver a bigger strike. But now, what had been thirty missiles became two much larger ones. They flew into the neatly cut trapezoidal tunnel mouth and hit the barrier. After the first missile cracked it, the second shattered it. I blazed through the opening at probably around fifty miles per hour, tucking my wings like a power-diving hawk targetting a rabbit.
The tunnel within was dimly lit, with [Ghost Lamp] torches burning instead of magic lanterns. [Ghost Lamp] has nothing to do with ghosts. It’s an Aether spell. It gets its name from the fact that it is practical only at low energies, casting a dim, eerie light from a ‘flame’ that looks like a weak St. Elmo’s fire.
As I rapidly decelerated, the tunnel descended, until it reached the actual dwarven highway, a wider trapezoidal tunnel with the same sort of lighting. I turned hard to avoid hitting the wall opposite the entrance tunnel, then braked to a halt and landed.
I lowered Aenëe to the floor, discovering to my surprise that my heart was actually beating fast and I was breathing hard. It was a sign that my pneuma was indeed beginning to flag. I really had been pushing it.
The young fairborn on the floor had a dazed look in her eyes as she stared at me.
“I need to finish healing you,” I muttered, preparing my magic again.
“Wait!” she demanded. “I mean… I get that I’m still a mess. I just coughed up some blood a moment ago, so yeah, I need healing, but… I don’t think I’m dying any time soon. You really look like you need to rest, My Lady!”
I blinked, for a moment not quite understanding what I was hearing. Then my brain caught up with me.
That’s right. That was one of the reasons I needed a shelter.
Bidding goodbye to my alter egos, I shut down the spiritual technique. The [Blood Sigil]s existed independently, running on the pneuma within the blood that formed them. Every other magic I was using, including my wings, I allowed to expire.
I called the tunnel ‘trapezoidal’, but the acute angles at the base of the trapezoid were actually squared off, creating half-pace-tall vertical faces. I dropped to the floor and leaned my back against the stone surface.
“It doesn’t take pneuma to look,” I said. “Turn and face me so I can check you.”
“It may not be much, but it does take some,” she (accurately) contradicted, but she did as requested anyhow.
I extended my spiritual sense into her, carefully combing through her body. Then I grimaced and shook my head.
“Just an extremely light dose,” I said as I held up my hand and placed it against her cuirass. “I need to diagnose you. [Healing].“
She looked down at my hand as the mild spell began, and her mouth quirked. “Interesting spot you chose.”
I looked down to see my hand on the metal cup of her cuirass and blushed.
“It’s not like I can feel it through that thing,” I rebutted as the information began coming to me from the divine feedback. I had concentrated on healing the heart and stopping major bleeding, but her heart was not yet fully healed. The remaining damage included a small amount of bleeding from one significant coronary blood vessel. Also, her lung was still punctured.
“That’s what I thought. There’s one thing that can’t wait,” I said, and increased the mana flow, concentrating first on the injured blood vessel. I continued until it sealed up, then expanded to restore the oxygen starved portions of the heart it had been failing to feed before I let the spell drop.
I was filled with intense fatigue now.
“We have company,” she commented as she rested her back against the wall again and closed her eyes. I looked in the direction she had gestured and extended my spiritual perception to peer through the dim light. As she had already noticed, warriors were marching double-time in our direction with weapons drawn.
